Abutilon
| Abutilon | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Abutilon pictum | |
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Plantae |
| (unranked): | Angiosperms |
| (unranked): | Eudicots |
| (unranked): | Rosids |
| Order: | Malvales |
| Family: | Malvaceae |
| Subfamily: | Malvoideae |
| Tribe: | Malveae |
| Genus: |
Abutilon Mill. |
| Species | |
|
about 200, see text |
|
| Synonyms | |
|
Abortopetalum O.Deg. |
|
about 200, see text
Abortopetalum O.Deg.
Beloere Shuttlew. ex A. Gray
Abutilon /əˈbjuːtᵻlɒn/ is a large genus of flowering plants in the mallow family, Malvaceae. It is distributed throughout the tropics and subtropics of the Americas, Africa, Asia, and Australia. General common names include Indian mallow and velvetleaf; in Russian, ornamental varieties are commonly known as the room maple. The genus name is an 18th-century New Latin word that came from the Arabic ’abū-ṭīlūn (أبو طيلون), the name given by Avicenna to this or a similar genus.
Plants of this genus include herbs, shrubs, and trees. They range in height from about 0.5 to 3 meters (1.5 to 10 feet). The herbage is generally hairy to woolly or bristly. The leaf blades are usually entire, but the occasional species has lobed leaves. They are palmately veined and have wavy or serrated edges. Flowers are solitary, paired, or borne in small inflorescences in the leaf axils or toward the branch tips. The calyx is bell-shaped with five lobes. The corolla is usually bell-shaped to wheel-shaped, with five petals joined at the bases.
The flowers of wild species are most often yellow or orange, but can be red or pinkish, sometimes with a darker center. The stamens are fused into a tube lined at the mouth with anthers. Inside the tube is the branching style with head-like stigmas. The fruit is a rounded or hemispherical schizocarp with up to 20 segments, each containing a few seeds.
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